WINDSOR – New Soo Greyhounds head coach Sheldon Keefe got a first-hand look at what’s been troubling the team this season.

In his debut behind the bench, Keefe watched the Greyhounds jump to a two-goal lead only to watch the Windsor Spitfires rally for a 3-2 win Thursday before 5,368 at the WFCU Centre.

“That’s what we’ve done all year,” Greyhounds defenceman Ryan Sproul said. “All year, we’ve been up and let teams back in and we have to find a way to stop that.”

Keefe, who replaced Mike Stapleton behind the bench, knows it will take some time to get the club where he wants it.

“There were a lot of good things tonight,” the 32-year-old Keefe said. “The guys worked hard and got off to a good start.”

The Greyhounds held a 16-11 edge in the opening 20 minutes and had the only goal of the first period. Michael Schumacher’s shot from along the boards was stopped by Windsor goalie Jaroslav Pavelka. The rebound went to rookie Sergey Tolchinsky in the slot and he buried it.

“He surprised me,” Spitfires head coach Bob Boughner said of Keefe. “He’s changed most of their systems.

“They used to play a one-two-two (forecheck) and now it’s a two-one-two. The used to run a standard d-zone coverage and now it’s a swarm.”

Schumacher would extend the lead to 2-0 in the second period when the Windsor defence could not handle the six-foot-five, 210-pound forward coming out of the corner and he beat Pavelka high to the stick side.

“Three weeks ago, we might have felt a little sorry for ourselves, but we did a good job of staying focused and were able to get a couple of goals,” said Spitfires forward Kerby Rychel, whose team won back-to-back games for just the second time in 30 games this season.

Saverio Posa was able to prevent a breakout pass by the Greyhounds at the blue line and rookie Josh Ho-Sang broke in two-on-one and made a great behind-the-back feed to Ben Johnson to put Windsor on the scoreboard.

“It says where we’re at as a team,” Keefe said. “We have to figure out the small deficiencies.

“It’s the little things in a tight game like this where the margin for error is so small.”

The Spitfires pulled even in the final minute of the second period after Darnell Nurse was called for cross checking Windsor’s Chris Marchese.

Brady Vail’s shot from the point found its way past Sault Ste. Marie goalie Matt Murray with 48.2 seconds left to tie it.

“That’s a good Windsor coaching staff over there,” Keefe said. “We had them on their heels early, but they made some adjustments and exposed some stuff.”

Windsor used a stretch pass up the middle against the Sault defence and had a couple of breakaway chances that Murray was forced to bail out his teammates.

“They’ve got a lot of offensive defencemen,” Rychel said. “Some of them like to go.”

With time winding down in the third period, Rychel would net the winner on the smallest mistake by Murray.

The goalie got Zach Lorentz’s shot, but dropped it briefly and Rychel swooped in to score with 4:18 left in regulation.

“Sometimes they go in, sometimes not,” Rychel said. “I had a few chances and saw it there and got it.”

The Greyhounds got Murray to the bench with 1:42 left in regulation, but could not beat Pavelka, who improved his career record against Sault Ste. Marie to 5-0-1-0 including three wins this season.

“We’re definitely having a hard time getting points and scoring,” said Sproul, who had the best chance down the stretch with a point blast that was gloved by Pavelka. “It’s a tough loss. It was (Keefe’s) first game and we wanted him to win.”

Keefe said the club will get back to working on things Friday before heading to Saginaw to face the Spirit on Saturday.

“I felt fine and I was confident back there,” Keefe said of his first game behind the bench. “Certainly, though, you need more than two days to get some of the things in place you want to do.”